Friday 19th May 2023

[refitman]

Morning all.

[tinyclanger2]

Morning.
Have joined the Ramblers qua right to roam - and not turning walking paths into cycle paths.

[RogerOThornhill]

Good morning.

'Er indoors is still in hospital getting sorted out.

Seen this?

Helen Lewis' take on the crackpots in London earlier this week.

Looking at the program, I noticed that one panel had two men named Sebastian and no women. The audience in the hall was perhaps four-fifths male. Both of these awkward facts underlined a problem with all these paeans to natalism: Most women don’t want to hear them. In countries where women have access to education and the job market, the birth rate falls. In Britain, the demographic that could solve the baby drought, those under 45, is struggling to buy houses after decades of soaring prices, and also declining to vote for right-wing parties. What does national conservatism have to offer these people? They can’t put a crib in a makeshift shelter built from remaindered copies of Jacob Rees-Mogg’s The Victorians. In one of the best speeches of the conference—because it was daringly tethered to empirical reality—the Substack author Ed West observed that “the world’s most effective form of contraception is the London housing market.”

https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fw ... F674095%2F

[gilsey]

The best take on that

[AnatolyKasparov]

They still had the sense to make a show of keeping their distance then.

Though I wouldn't overstate it - fans of Orbanism weren't too hard to find on the Tory front line, let alone backbench, then too.

[gilsey]

Yes Mr Rentool, the magic money tree otherwise known as the BoE prints the money, or if you really can't stomach that, we can raise it on the bond markets and the bill payers pay the interest - indefinitely, no need to repay the capital. Or a combination of the two.

What's more concerning than the cash is the suspicion that actually, we're not capable of building it, going by our recent record of delivering big capital projects.

[frog222]

@sky -- thanks for the Report !

@gilsey -- the Ancients didn't have the BoE and 'modern economists' to tell them what was impossible

In other news --

Two staff off sick in sister’s uni library team in Puerto Rico, and yesterday afternoon a student was off to hospital for the third time with post-covid seizures . (fainting and convulsions)
It’s just like the ‘flu etc etc ad inf

[AnatolyKasparov]

But it is like the flu, for *most* people. And of course most under the age of 18 will not be vaccinated.

[refitman]

But it is like the flu, for *most* people. And of course most under the age of 18 will not be vaccinated.

It's also still killing 1000s of people. Why do you keep downplaying it AK?

[gilsey]

@gilsey -- the Ancients didn't have the BoE and 'modern economists' to tell them what was impossible

Just imagine what the BoE would have said about the pyramids.

Bazalgette must be turning in his grave.

[gilsey]

But it is like the flu, for *most* people. And of course most under the age of 18 will not be vaccinated.

I've never had flu in my life but I have now had covid, not nice at all but unlike many I seem to have made a full recovery. Might not be so lucky next time, and maybe no more vaccinations. Don't understand why not, if vaccination is the main/only strategy to minimise the effects. Just how many people do they want to be joining the long-term sick?

The failure to vaccinate children is the worst of it, imo.

[gilsey]

A woman I know was off work for months with long covid and has now had to stop driving due a type of epilepsy, focal temporal lobe seizures.

Late 30s at a guess, formerly fit and well, good job in IT.

[frog222]

But it is like the flu, for *most* people. And of course most under the age of 18 will not be vaccinated.

I've never had flu in my life but I have now had covid, not nice at all but unlike many I seem to have made a full recovery. Might not be so lucky next time, and maybe no more vaccinations. Don't understand why not, if vaccination is the main/only strategy to minimise the effects. Just how many people do they want to be joining the long-term sick?

The failure to vaccinate children is the worst of it, imo.

I looked to see if Deepti had anything recent on child vaccination**, which she's been on about for years, just found this -



I changed supermarkets three years ago, because of masking, and one of the staff has continued alone when the others dropped out . We've exchanged any number of complicit masked smiles
She told me just now that covid is on the up, because an increasing number of unmasked customers tell her they have it !

Of course vaccination is only one defence, and neglecting ALL the others is pretty dumb.

BTW @gilsey, being 'recovered ' is unfortunately not enough , surprises from deep damage do occur.

** I was one of the first to have the polio vaccine. A slightly older doc friend told us last week that two kids died of measles in his school and one of polio .

[frog222]

A woman I know was off work for months with long covid and has now had to stop driving due a type of epilepsy, focal temporal lobe seizures.
Late 30s at a guess, formerly fit and well, good job in IT.

I have one daughter and one friend only working part-time, and that intermittently ... one since 12/3/20 the other 20/12/20.
Here's a surprise !

[refitman]

Huh